Another Great Day...

After a leisure time this morning, Mark and I decided to head into The Springs for a couple of errands and a few photo opportunities.

My telephone hasn't been staying charged to well lately, so, we made a stop by the Verizon store.  I looked into upgrading, but the phone I wanted wasn't available, so I settled for a new battery.  Maybe somewhere down the road I will take care of that upgrade, but for now, I think I am fixed up.

Then, while we were in the area, we drove up to the

 

Broadmoor Hotel.  It is still a very exclusive area of town and the hotel and

grounds were beautiful.

Forbes Travel Guide Five-Star Awards (formerly Mobil Five-Star Award by Mobil Travel Guide) announced its list of Five-Star winners for 2010 and honored The Broadmoor for a record 50^th consecutive year. The Broadmoor is the only property ever to achieve this status.

We made our way through the neighborhood to see

 

this home.  In the yard we found these

huge sculptures.

The artist, Starr Kempf, began to work in bronze sculpture in 1955, which he sold to collectors around the United States. As of 1977, his vision had blossomed into the creation of elaborate steel wind sculptures, each of which took him up to three years to construct. His kinetic wind sculptures were designed to exhibit graceful movement and interaction with the wind, and took the form of birds

and wind vanes, often soaring to more than fifty feet in height.

A pretty amazing site!

Next, we made our way down to

 

the Garden of the Gods Park.  We have been here many times, but, it still remains a favorite spot.  Today, we just took a drive through the park to

get a couple of

rock pictures, and especially

The Balanced Rock.

Time to head to Old Colorado City, where we had plans to meet

Jim, Ellie, Ed, Marilyn, Ginger, and Jesse for lunch.  Great lunch, great folks, and we are so glad that our paths have crossed yet again and we could get together for a long needed visit.

Even after a couple of hours here at Amanda's Fonda Restaurant, the visiting

continued in the parking lot.  You just can't shut those guys up, and they talk about us girls talking all the time!

After hugs and "see you laters", Jim and Ellie loaded up with us and we headed out to take in a few more sites.

Our first stop was the

International Fallen Firefighters Memorial Park.

I loved the

sculptures that

were all around

the park.  But, all the

names on the walls around the park were far too many...these are just the names from 9/11.

After, our time here, we traveled on to the

US Olympic Training Center.  Again, lots of beautiful

sculptures to

see.

Just outside the

Visitor's Center is the clock counting down time until the

next Olympics.  Inside the center, we saw

torches and

gold medals.

We walked through the

Hall of Fame, (Andrew, this is for you).

A trip through the gift shop and then it was time for us to be on our way.

We made one last stop at Sportsman Warehouse where we purchased a burner for our large stock pot.  The afternoon was then well on it's way to becoming early evening as we dropped Jim and Ellie off at their car.

We have spent a great few days with them, but, now it is time for them to finalize the last of the plans for their daughter's wedding on Saturday.  We want to wish Robin and Paul many many years of happiness as they join their hearts and their families together on Saturday evening.  Jim and Ellie, catch your breath and enjoy the moment!

Mark and I then headed up the mountain and into the rain which has lingered on into the night hours.

Gosh, what can I say except we were so  blessed with another great day!